


What Makes a Dad

by TheDisneyOutsider



Series: Iron Dad and His Spider-Son [2]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), Spider-Man - All Media Types
Genre: Father's Day, Sickfic, Tony Stark Acting as Peter Parker's Parental Figure, Tony Stark is a Good Dad, Vomiting, proud dad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-20
Updated: 2020-06-20
Packaged: 2021-03-04 04:35:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24827674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDisneyOutsider/pseuds/TheDisneyOutsider
Summary: Peter is assigned to write a paper about the difference between a Father and a Dad. He realizes something along the way.
Relationships: Peter Parker & Tony Stark
Series: Iron Dad and His Spider-Son [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1796242
Comments: 44
Kudos: 469





	What Makes a Dad

**Author's Note:**

> Just a cute little Father's Day fic about our favourite father/son duo!

_What is the difference between a Father and a Dad?_

The question had been staring up from Peter’s page for twenty minutes, and he still had yet to write down a single word.

Peter was all too familiar with these types of writing assignments around Father’s Day and though he never said anything to anybody, he wished schools wouldn’t be so insensitive to the students who had no dads or fathers.

It used to hurt him worse. He would put off those assignments until the very last minute, finally writing down a Hallmark-style paragraph, the words the teachers wanted to hear, the ones that would make everyone forget that he was different. That he wasn’t perfect. That his family wasn’t a broken, mismatched, make-shift puzzle, full of people who loved Peter greatly but weren’t connected to him by blood. The last time he had someone remotely close to that description was when Uncle Ben was still living. Still, a kid writing about an uncle instead of a father put a damper on people’s happy holiday, so Peter learned early on to just bullshit the damn paper.

He was so used to manipulating his words to form the pretty picture of a perfect family, it had become second nature. But, as the question ran over and over in Peter’s head this time, something stopped him. Something felt different.

_What is the difference between a father and a dad?_ Peter read again, but this time he started writing.

_A father congratulates you when you bring home the medal, a dad is in the front row cheering you on._

“In the correct Lewis dot structure of a nitrogen atom, how many dots should there be around the N?”

“Five,” Peter buzzed in confidently.

“That is correct! Midtown is the winner!”

“Woooo, go Pete!” came a yell from the back of the room and Peter’s face turned bright red.

“Boss, do I need to remind you that we’re supposed to be incognito?” Happy whispered from beside him.

“Forget that I’m taking the whole team out for milkshakes!” Tony beamed, already getting up to meet the boy backstage.

Happy shook his head as he followed behind, already getting Pepper on the phone to prepare her for a media frenzy.

_A father asks if you have everything you need, a dad makes sure you do._

“Hey Pete, how was your day?” Tony asked as Peter entered the penthouse and went to the fridge to grab an apple and a juice box.

“Not bad, I got an A on that Math quiz I took on Friday.”

“Of course you did,” the older man smiled proudly, ruffling the boy’s hair when he sat down on the stool opposite him. His eyes caught sight of the boy's feet, and he frowned. “Why is your toe sticking out of your shoe?”

“Huh,” Peter mumbled, focused on his after school snack, “Oh, I caught it on an old fence last week.”

“You’ve been walking around with a ripped shoe for a _week_? It’s October, Pete! Isn’t your foot cold?”

“Oh, it’s fine, Tony. Aunt May gets paid next week, I’ll live until then.”

Tony shook his head halfway through the boy’s sentence, “You can’t walk around with your shoes like that. Let me take you to the store, we can fix this issue right now.”

“No, Tony! Seriously, I’m fine! I really appreciate it, but I’ll get some next week, don’t worry.”

Tony relented and Peter was glad the issue was dropped. Shortly after, the two got to work and all was forgotten. Or Peter had thought.

The next day, Peter got home from school and went to throw his backpack in his room before heading out on patrol. As he tossed the bag onto his bed, he saw six boxes lined up neatly on top. He opened them to find multiple pairs of converse, all in different colours and a note scrawled beside them. _These should last you a while. I wasn’t sure which colour you’d prefer, so I bought_ _one of each_ _. Be safe on patrol tonight. TS._

Peter shook his head and pulled out his phone.

**PP: Excessive much?**

**TS: Do you like that brand or do you prefer Vans? Or I could get both...**

**PP: They’re great. Thanks, Tony. Even if you’re impossible.**

**TS: Could say the same about you, Spider-Kid :)**

_A father yells at you when you do something wrong, a dad teaches you how to do better._

“Okay, this is going to sound really bad, but I swear it’s not as bad as it sounds!” Peter spoke without taking a breath.

“What did you do?” Tony sighed, turning from his workbench, realizing that this was probably going to need his full attention.

“First you have to promise you won’t yell.”

“Pete, I--”

“Promise!”

“How can you ask me to promise not to yell when you’re yelling at me?”

The boy gave him a serious look, and he relented, “Fine, I promise not to yell. Now spill it, what did you do?”

“Okay, so first I have to say, you left the keys in the ignition, so it’s actually kind of your fault.”

“You’re already making it extremely hard not to yell, kid. Out with it.”

“I may or may not have driven your Audi into the cement post in the parking garage...”

“You—” he took a deep breath and continued calmly, “How did that happen?”

“Well, I saw it there when I was coming up, and it looked really cool. I’ve never been in the driver’s seat of it before, so I thought I’d just check it out. Then I thought I could practice my parking, you know I’m not very good at that yet--”

“Clearly!”

“Tony! Anyway, turns out I misjudged my strength on the pedal, and well...”

“Cement post?”

“Yeah... Are you going to yell?”

Tony sighed, “I’m not going to yell.”

Peter let the tension falls from his shoulders.

“I’m going to teach you how to park correctly.”

“Really!?”

“Yep, then I’m going to teach you how to buff out a dent and touch up a paint job.”

“Okay!”

“You sound way too excited for a kid who just ran my forty thousand dollar Audi, into a cement post, Kiddo.”

“Oh, sorry. Okay...” he put on his best sad face and Tony couldn’t help but let out a loud laugh.

“We’ll work on that too.”

_A father can leave, a dad never does._

Peter threw up into the toilet bowl for the fifth time that night. His mouth tasted like bile, his head was pounding and his pajamas were clung to him from sweat.

“You can leave Mr. Stark, May will be back at ten, I’m fine,” he assured, head going back into the bowl, vomiting out more of the soup Tony had tried feeding him ten minutes prior.

“Kid, look at you, you can barely stand up straight. You should have called me right away when you started feeling so bad.”

The kid’s head resurfaced, and he rested it against his arms, “I can handle it, Tony, really. I’m sure you have more important things you need to be doing right now.”

“That’s where you’re wrong, Underoos because right now a sick Spider-Kid is my top priority. You ready to get back in bed or do you think there’s more coming out?”

“I think I’m good.”

“Alright, let’s get you up then,” The man held out his hand and gently pulled the boy up, guiding him back to his room and into his bed. Once he was situated, Tony sat on the edge of the bed.

“You probably need some meds, but I think we should wait until your stomach is a bit more settled. Think you can keep down some ginger ale?”

Peter let his eyes fall shut and leaned back on his pillows, “Maybe,” he shrugged honestly.

Tony got him a can from the fridge and held it up so that the kid could take small sips from the straw.

One minute. Two minutes. Three.

“Tony, I think I’m gonna--”

Half a second later Tony had a lap full of puke and a very upset kid on his hands.

“I’m SO sorry! Oh my God, I’ll clean it up and I’ll buy you new clothes, and--”

“Excuse me! Okay, the adult is talking now, it’s fine Peter. You’re sick, it happens.”

“I threw up all over you!” he reminded as if the stench wasn’t already hitting Tony’s nostrils.

“And thank goodness we have these things called showers and washing machines, huh?” the man responded calmly.

“You should go. You shouldn’t have to deal with this.”

“I’m not going anywhere, kid. Come on, let’s get us cleaned up and you back in bed, huh?”

“I really don’t feel good, Tony.”

“I know, kid. I know. I’ll get you fixed up.”

* * *

Mr. Stark, Tony as Peter was so used to calling him at this point, had come into his life a year and a half prior. Their relationship was rocky at the start, Peter trying his hardest to communicate through Happy, trying to get Tony to see him as more than just a kid running around in a red and blue onesie. It took a long time for them to get where they were now, but the payoff was definitely worth it.

Peter scanned his page and felt proud. For the first time in years, his words felt authentic. Maybe he wasn’t so different from his classmates after all. He might not have a father anymore, but somehow along the way, he may have accidentally got himself a dad?

The next day, Peter woke up early, and rewrote his paper, adding a few extra paragraphs that would only be meant for one person to read. He put it in an envelope and grabbed a messily wrapped package from his nightstand before heading out the door.

“Tony?”

“Kid? Hey, Bud. What are you doing here?”

“Well, uh- I mean, it’s Sunday today.” he stumbled over his words.

“Yep, I was pretty sure it was Sunday, thanks for confirming that.”

“No, it’s, ugh just, here,” he shoved the envelope and package into Tony’s chest.

“What’s this?”

“Just,” he motioned with his hands for him to open them.

Tony tore the envelope open and scanned the paper, right down to the last line.

_Thank you for always being there for me, Tony. I’ve always thought about what it would be like to have a dad, but lately, I haven’t felt the need to wonder as much._

When he was done, his eyes flicked up to meet the kid’s, “You mean all this?”

“I- Yeah. I mean, I don’t want to freak you out or anything, I know you’re not actually my dad. It’s just, it’s Father’s Day and it felt wrong not doing something. We had this assignment for school and I guess the longer I wrote, the more I realized, the person I was writing about was you.”

He looked up with red cheeks, “Are you freaked out?”

Tony cleared his throat, “I’m not freaked out.”

“You’re not?”

He shook his head, “I feel pretty lucky, actually. Twenty-year-old Tony would have never imagined getting a letter like this one from anybody, especially not from such a great kid.”

“So you like it?”

“I love it, kiddo.”

“You can open the gift too,” Peter gestured to the mess of colourful wrapping and Tony picked it up.

He opened it and examined the small piece of plastic thoughtfully, “What is this?”

“A goatee shaper, the commercial says you get the perfect goatee every time!”

Tony looked back and forth from the hunk of plastic to the eager kid and after a moment he snorted out a laugh.

Peter cracked a smile, then grinned wildly, “I know it’s pretty dumb, but you’re a hard person to shop for!”

“No, bud,” Tony shook his head, sobering up and pulling the kid into his shoulder, “This might be the best gift I’ve ever received.”

“Happy Father’s Day, Tony.”

“Thanks, Spiderling.”

**Author's Note:**

> Not going to lie, I heard an ad on the radio for a goatee shaper and that is how this fic got started haha. It seemed like something Peter would get a kick out of for Tony :)
> 
> Hope you enjoyed! Wish Tony a Happy Father's Day in the comments below!


End file.
